377

Sure. The FBI got Perry Stevens to covertly pack military locator radio beacons in McCoy's chutes. They transmit on 243.0 MHz with a swept tone. UHF ADFs on military planes can home in on them. There are hand held DFs that can home in on them too. I posted photos of one long ago. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

It's been extensively discussed in past posts Jo. What info do you seek? 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Sure. It's possible. The question is too technically garbled to intelligently answer. Really. Nope. Unless three towers are in a straight line they will always be in a triangle. I have no idea what the significance of the tower geometry was to Duane. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Did you miss the smiley face Bill? It's not an immoral lie. It's a J O K E. No offense was intended. Those who know you would never connect with with a real naked jump. I know you don't drink, so beer isn't on the menu, but maybe a cool soda would help. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Bill Cole wrote When you really think about it, exiting the plane chuteless is the ultimate "naked" jump. 377 (sometimes clueless, but never chuteless) 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

About half a mile. Novice jumper. Bad spot. High winds. I landed going backwards at at least 10 knots. On a S/L jump I once landed many miles from the DZ. My jumpmaster put me out over a solid cloud cover. He and the pilot messed up trying to use a VOR and a stopwatch. No harm done but a potentially fatal error. The Lake Erie tragedy. http://www.metafilter.com/64215/Worst-Civilian-Skydiving-Accident Aircraft navigation error. Combination of pilot negligence, jumper negligence and ATC negligence. Jumped through a cloud layer while over water. ATC gave pilot incorrect position based on misinterpretation of radar target. Cooper, under an unmodified C9 round, was basically descending without propulsion or steering. He was drifting with the wind. Even if the canopy had a 4 line cut mod he wouldn't have had much ability to navigate during descent. Today's ram air square canopies are capable of far far more. Not much. He could try steering or slipping the canopy but the effect would be minimal. I do know what you mean. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I was obsessed with road flares as a kid. We lived near RR tracks and the switch men would leave lots of flares laying around, OLIN FUSEES, I still have a recollection of the labels. Most were only 20-30 % burned down and then the switch men would snuff them out by whacking the tips on the rails. They were hard to relight but it was doable with persistance. We found quite a few unused ones as well with the striker cap igniter intact. Those ones were prized. We did all sorts of bad things with em, including melting lead linotype slugs from the local newspaper's scrap pile and casting our own crude fishing weights. Also explored the city's spooky storm drain system using these to light the way. We tried unsuccessfully to make them explode. We emptied the powder from one of the kid's Dad's shotgun shells and mixed it with the sulphur powder that was in the flares. Used JetX model rocket motor fuses but all we could get was a flash burn not a big boom even when we put it in a Bell Jar. Kid now days are over protected. They miss out on these formative experiences. Thank God. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Quade wrote Q doesn't care? Really? I expected more passion even from the "worlds most boring skydiver". I care way too much as evidenced by my purchase of a Cooper twenty and my repeated efforts to make it talk. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Can you imagine if Vince Bugliosi defended an accused Cooper? Besides being a formidable prosecutor and razor sharp defense lawyer he is a very talented author. Read The Sea Will Tell or Helter Skelter. I'd love to read a Bugliosi book on Norjack. It would be a masterpiece. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Right you are Robert. Pretty amazing to see 60 year old jets earning a living today: http://www.flightglobal.com/airspace/blogs/drewski2112/archive/2009/12/11/the-boeing-chase-planes.aspx 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I believe this was Farflungs last post before he disappeared. I sure wish someone could confirm that he is OK. Sure miss his posts, graphics and humor. I DO NOT miss his pesky reminders that whuffo skyjackers have jumped from jets and survived just fine. He really messed with my "DBC had to be a jumper" mantra. Now that Farf is gone I can go back to MAC SOG HALO land. Wish we could get Snow, Farf, Orange, Sluggo and all of the old gang back on here. Those were good times. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Yup. That "thug" music is akin to deadly force, especially at 140dB SPL. If it were a Mozart concerto, even at the same volume, it would be an entirely different story. I used to do criminal defense law. I spent time doing public defender work representing indigent ghetto defendants of all races. Talk to a judge, cop, prosecutor or a defense lawyer candidly and they will tell you what really happens in the trenches. Suffice it to say that the crim justice system has a long way to go before it is truly race neutral. I had a black attorney friend, a brilliant guy, who drove a very expensive Ferrari during the late 70s and early 80s. He got pulled over soooo many times by LAPD on BS stops. It was basically a case of "we better light him up, he must have stolen that car." If he had a white girlfriend in the car the stops were even more frequent. No tickets, no overt insults or brutality, but endless stops and delays. Never an apology. Guilty until proven innocent. He finally sold the car and drove something non descript. I think these days cops are required to record the race of the driver on vehicle stops so that stats can be compiled. I'll bet they are more cautious now. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Poignant stuff. I can't really directly connect Peterson's moral outrage and anguish to the "grudge" that DBC allegedly professed, but Peterson was forever altered by atrocities he witnessed in thge Mekong Delta. His book The Idiots Frightful Laughter was part of a personal mission to inform the populace and mobilize opposition to US atrocities and war crimes. Why did he suddenly pull the book off the market? From his writings you can see that he is an intelligent and articulate person. He also was a versatile and gutsy skydiver with a history of edgy jump exploits (e.g. home made bat wings, night water jumps, skydiving in Saigon). Add USFS smoke jumper experience, Boeing tech documents worker, and according to Saishaw, a very early interest in the mechanics of the 727 rear door and stairs. FBI ruled him out as DBC based on DNA. If they believed his Nepal alibi why why would they have returned and insisted on a DNA sample? Eyes are blue. Character seems inconsistent with threats of violence, extortion and a large theft. Sure wish someone well versed on NORJACK could interview him. He avoids me like the plague. Initially he was very grateful for the holiday cheer basket I sent him through Bruce, but has since labeled me as FBI/CIA and doesnt respond to any communication attempts 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

You are almost correct Robert. What you saw was a Lockheed T33. Close cousin. There never were any civilian P80s. Boeing used a T33 as a chase plane for a while I believe. They aren't horribly expensive. Here's a very nice one for well under 100K. http://www.t-33.us 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

The S turn scenario is likely a myth. F 106s could pace a 727, even a slow one. I watched a team of CA ANG F 106s from Fresno do a display at an air show. They did formation flybys at high speeds and at low speeds. No big deal. Stall speed in an F 106 was 107 knots. Cooper's 727 was flying way faster than that. The Fresno ANG unit converted to F 16s when the 106s were retired. Several pilots later expressed a preference for their old 106s. Want your own F 106? Just add money. http://www.f-106deltadart.com/westernair_f-106_sale_pkg.htm 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Mr. Shutter wrote Yes on punch cards. But they were not used to record raw radar video. Yes, rain attenuates and also reflects radar signals. Hard to say what effect it had that night on that target. ATC surveillance radar just gives bearing and range not altitude. Altitude info comes from aircraft transponders. Height finding radar uses nodding antennas for vertical angle scanning. You see them on aircraft carriers, missile tracking facilities etc. Radar signal processing has advanced hugely since 71, but even 71 vintage X band surveillance radars could paint jumpers, birds and rain cells. Don't know the details of McChords involvement. If they were controlling the F 106 interceptors then they were deeply involved. If the MA1 system had been working properly the F 106 autopilots could have been controlled by SAGE target data through a microwave data link and they could have been steered to intercept the 727. No surprise it appeared to be inoperative. I worked for the MA 1's mfr. It suffered from reliability problems. It was a truly amazing system when it worked. http://www.f-106deltadart.com/sage_system.htm 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Knowing that jumpers in freefall can be seen by ATC radars over considerable disrtances (20+ miles) I spent a lot of time pinging former SAGE operators and techs. Bottom line is a jumper would probably not be seen on on the SAGE display due to graphics processing. The jumper echo may very well have been in the raw radar video output but it would not have made it to the screen. That still leaves the individual FAA ATC radars which did not process echoes the same way that the networked SAGE system did. I have spoken at length with a skydiver who works FAA ATC as his day job. He said he cold see INDIVIDUAL jumpers on his scope and give jump pilots accurate counts of how many jumpers had exited. Guru, a skydiver and jump pilot, confirmed this. Tuna boat S band radar can see birds 20 miles away. Furno makes special "bird radars" just for this purpose. Radar tapes are routinely preserved in avaiation accident or incident cases. What happened to the Cooper tapes??? If the raw video was taped and preserved it probably showed Cooper's exit. Was Rosemary Woods working for the FAA? 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Mr. Shutter wrote With uncertainties in both flight path and exit timing all sorts of things "might" have happened. The pressure bump, to me, is convincing evidence of Cooper's exit, but not absolute proof. The T Bar money really throws a wrench into the gearbox. I just can't come up with an explanation that makes sense. Its a curve ball. A swing and a miss. Just finishing Towsaw's book. Its a good read but doesn't add much to the discussion here. It is amazing how much of his own time and money he spent looking for Cooper's remains. From a news article: 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Which illustrates my prior point. The initial posts here about Bruce's site werent blocked. After a couple were posted it was declared off limits for future posts. I dont like any censorship but that's less censorship than blocking initial posting attempts. Its all bad, but some is less bad than others. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Paul sure took his appointed task as your human AAD seriously. You owe him beer at the very least. That's one jump I'd never make without an AAD. Seen several videos of hypoxic exits. Sobering. Those loopy hypoxic jumpers think they are just fine. Did two Mulllins high jumps at WFFC. Such a bargain at $48 per jump. I've been amused that Red Bull spent over $30 million to give Felix only slightly more than twice the freefall time we got for $48. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Quade wrote Lets assume he died either on impact or later from injuries or exposure. Seems very likely that his remains and at least some gear would be discovered. It's not a jungle. The area is traveled year after year by hunters and other recreational users. If he landed alive there was no need to do a super hiding job on the parachute gear. All he needed to do was conceal it enough so it wouldn't be easily seen before he could complete his escape. He could have splashed but Georger presented a convincing analysis that showed this ending to be very unlikely. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I don't like restraints on free speech. Quade punishes speech that he finds offensive but I've seen no evidence that he has prevented anybody's posts from appearing prior to banning. Bruce has created a system of prior restraint. That's a little bit ironic. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

ANY parachuting related question or statement will be a breath of fresh air here Propblast. Fire away. "We interrupt the Jerry Springer, Dr. Phil, Judge Judy, Oprah show to bring you some relevant on topic information." 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Anyone home? Awful quiet around here lately. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

The 727 that attended WFFC in the later years was a freighter operated by AMJET. My guess is that most freight dog 27s remove the stairs to save weight and therefore increase payload. You need to get jumpers out FAST on a WFFC jet jump. Delay is distance. Some DC 9 jumpers who were last out landed quite a way off DZ. Stairs would really slow down the exits. The DC 9 had the stairs removed. We exited 85 jumpers in about a minute. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.